Pain.

Posted on June 9, 2013 by mlgray

At mile 17 I’m in a fast stride going up a rather steep and long hill, “walking with purpose,” as my mantra has become.  The sun is starting to emerge from the clouds, and the cool, crisp air of the dawn race start is sneaking away.  I feel good: my muscles are burning, I’m taking steady, deep breaths, and my heart rate remains at a clean aerobic rhythm.

“Good work,” a fellow runner says to me as I pass by her. She’s struggling with the uphill, and has all day. “You too,” I respond, “see you on the downhill.”  She might be struggling with these inclines, but the descents are absolutely trashing me.  Continue reading →

Posted in Community, Running, Travel | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

The Panama Chronicles: Episode 5 – The Rearview Mirror

Posted on March 10, 2013 by mlgray

Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day. You shall begin it serenely and with too high a spirit to be encumbered with your old nonsense.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson

A good friend posted this quote to her Facebook page this week and I’ve reflected on it as I grappled with writing my last post on Panama.  I put these Panamanian vacation chronicles aside nearly three months ago, thinking that it would be interesting to write the concluding chapter some months later.  How would my perspectives about the trip change? What would I remember? Which final moments would stand out? Continue reading →

Posted in Community, Conversations on Travel, Panama, Travel | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Up and Down Above Boulder

Posted on March 3, 2013 by mlgray

This will be my last post on running for a while here at graywanderings.com . . . if you are interested in more running adventures, check-out my latest collaborative project, and what motivates me to run at: http://lymphedemaawareness.blogspot.com/

* * * * * * *

Sometimes my runs are squeezed between a long to-do list.  I often push the amount of time I have and the miles I can accomplish. Today, I need to complete this run in about two hours.  Despite the time pressure I’ve given myself, I jog slowly over the crest of a familiar hill. Jogging slowly?  Yes, a redundancy indeed.  I should call it a shuffle . . .

I shuffle over the crest of a familiar hill, well-aware that a nice descent awaits me on the other side.  In long-distance trail running you look forward to changes in direction, inclines, declines, and variations in scenery. What I didn’t think through is that at this time of year, the next section of trail will be covered in snow. Continue reading →

Posted in At Home in Denver & the Rockies, Running, Travel | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

Lost in Suburbia

Posted on February 27, 2013 by mlgray

I’m not sure how it happened, but about ninety minutes into the run, I’m no longer on the High Line Canal Trail.  There’s a puzzling detour sign at the end of a cul-de-sac in a nice neighborhood. Sporting my classy jogger costume once again, I’m tempted to flag down the next car, but the passing stranger is probably more likely to call the cops about the sweating beast harassing the locals than give me directions.

I scratch my beard in contemplation.  The map pinned to the bright orange road sign doesn’t make sense.  I just passed mile marker 29 (the trail runs for nearly 50 miles across Denver through an urban greenway). How could the trail go that way, into the depths of suburbia?  And why is there a detour on a trail anyway?

Continue Reading . . .

Posted in At Home in Denver & the Rockies, Running, Travel | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Running to Metamorphose

Posted on February 24, 2013 by mlgray

I’d like to spend this week promoting another project I’m working on and sharing some background as to why I’ve taken up long-distance endurance running.  The following post was originally posted at the home site for the Lymphedema Awareness Team, where I’m actively blogging about my running adventures.  This is really important and personal writing and organizational development work for me, so I hope you check it out!

Life has a way of metamorphosing: caterpillars transforming into butterflies; a love for the outdoors turning into an obsession; an unexpected health issue inspiring positive action.

 * * * * *

On June 2nd, 2012 I held my two-week old niece for the first time.  By far the youngest baby I’ve ever interacted with, and the first of her generation in our family. The immediate love for her, as I was told it would be, was remarkable and quite unexplainable.

Later that month, after that visit, my mom called to explain to me that my niece had been diagnosed with Lymphedema: a rare disease for newborn infants.  The swelling in her leg had not been from an allergic reaction or a bug bite as we first assumed, but from a genetic mutation that kept her lymph system from working properly.  While it’s a manageable condition, Lymphedema certainly alters one life.  For a precious little human who has only been around for a month, that’s not a metamorphoses you are ready to understand.

 * * * * *

Within those same few weeks in June, I went out for a trail run, something I’d never really done. The mile-high air of Idyllwild, California filled my lungs with a beautiful rush.  I’ve hiked all my life, but jogging through the woods was a new and wonderful sensation. Continue reading →

Posted in At Home in California, At Home in Denver & the Rockies, Community, Running, Travel | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments

I Went Out For A Run And Came Back With A Protractor

Posted on February 10, 2013 by mlgray

Mile 10, as it so often is.

The concrete vibrates through my running shoes, into my feet and ankles, up into my legs, and even begins to rock my head.  I turn up the Led Zeppelin on my ipod, focus on my form, and try to tune-out the pounding. But I can’t.

I spent the last 90 minutes running from the R.E.I. near downtown Denver, past industrial zones of warehouses, factories, and power plants, alongside and under interstates, highways, and busy surface streets, through the projects, and next to the Platte River in all its urban might.  While I knew my route before I began, and though I smiled at the guts of the city, there’s no way in hell I’m running back. Continue reading →

Posted in At Home in Denver & the Rockies, Running, Travel | Tagged , , , , | 8 Comments

Still Wandering!

Posted on February 5, 2013 by mlgray

Hey fellow readers and writers-

Yes indeed, I wandered away from the written word for a little bit too long.  I suppose I needed a break from blogging to refocus and reevaluate for 2013. But I’m back, outlining and planning new content for my Sunday morning posts.  Please join me again for more wanders starting February the 10th.

More soon . . .

Posted in At Home in Denver & the Rockies, Travel | 1 Comment

The Panama Chronicles: Episode 4 — Beach Time?

Posted on December 16, 2012 by mlgray

A Panamanian Vacation

The beach faces due south, so the sun sets over the shoreline to the west, not directly over the ocean as I’m accustomed to in most parts of California. But nothing in Panama is quite what I’m accustomed to anyway, so the orientation of the sun is par for this tropical vacation. I angle my recliner that direction and line my table up so that the crisp local beer remains close at hand.  I gaze into the sky’s changing colors, marvel at the clouds as their forms evolve and shift into new shapes, and loiter on the cooling sand just a bit longer than most other vacationers.

A few sandpipers chase the waves, hunting for their evening meal; pelicans fly over head, doing the same; and several couples and groups of people walk along the path between the beach and the resort, also in search of their evening meal from one of the ten restaurants, buffets, or grilles available to them . . . a bit easier hunting than the pelicans’ nose dives. I take a sip of my lager, and feel the earliest twinge of hunger.  Where will we dine tonight?

But what the heck am I doing here? Continue reading →

Posted in Conversations on Travel, Panama, Travel | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

The Panama Chronicles: Episode 3 — Panama City (x4)

Posted on December 10, 2012 by mlgray

A Panamanian Vacation

Yes indeed, there are four Panama Cities.  Henry Morgan sacked the first in 1671. A monk wandered off and founded the second (never knowing that centuries later it would become a hippie/backpacker’s haven).  The United States ensured the creation of the Canal Zone, a Panama City all its own, while digging the 8th Wonder of the World. And somewhere in between it all, the skyscraping, hustling, bustling, cosmopolitan Dubai of Latin America emerged on the shores of the Pacific: The Panama City.

Prior to an afternoon of watching the massive cargo ships pass through the Canal on our “tourist day” during this Panamanian Vacation, our tour guide Manuel lead us through these four Panama Cities.  Despite his one detour to an “authentic” gold smithing (gold plating) workshop of ancient (molded knock-offs, government approved) trinkets, we hung on Manuel’s every word.  Continue reading →

Posted in Panama, Travel | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Panama Chronicles: Episode 2 — The Canal

Posted on December 2, 2012 by mlgray

A Panamanian Vacation

A cargo ship carrying 5000 containers packed full of, well, just about anything and everything you could possibly imagine, eases into the first Miraflores lock.  From our vantage point outside of the Canal Museum, sitting on bleachers with other tourists, local school groups, and Canal gawkers of all ages, it appears the vessel is much too large for the narrow channel. Can they really navigate the ship through here? Continue reading →

Posted in Panama, Travel | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments